Employers in safety-critical industries might be entitled to enforce zero tolerance policies because there is no scientific test for impairment arising from cannabis use, a Fair Work Commission full bench has suggested.
The Productivity Commission has denied it is "sceptical" of the need for unfair dismissal laws, and says the questions it will ask in its IR inquiry is whether they achieve their purpose and if there is a better way of doing things.
A Qantas pilot who sexually harassed a female crew member while heavily intoxicated during an international stopover was responsible for his own actions and had suffered "a catastrophic fall from grace", the Fair Work Commission has ruled in rejecting his unfair dismissal claim.
The Fair Work Commission has commended BHP Coal's approach to disciplining a tanker driver whose unintentional overwatering of a road at its Peak Downs Mine caused a rollover that wrote off a $1.2m truck and injured a colleague.
The Fair Work Commission has granted Patrick Stevedores' Port Botany workers access to how they scored when assessed to fill the reduced number of positions at the terminal post-automation, while at the same time venting frustration at the warring parties and withdrawing from private arbitration.
In separate out-of-time rulings, the Fair Work Commission has rejected a sacked employee's challenge to when his dismissal took effect, but given another employee the benefit of the doubt on the "unreliability" of the tribunal's e-filing system.
Senior FWC members will head up enterprise bargaining and dispute resolution workshops in a pilot to kick off in Sydney next month, as part of the tribunal's broader strategy to encourage more productive workplaces.
The Abbott Government will ease the gender reporting requirements on employers, in a move that it claims will cut compliance costs by more than a third.
